Dal Makhani; Spicy Lentils with Kidney Beans

Had one of those days recently when I got home and had nothing in the house except store cupboard ingredients. I felt like cooking some lentils so I had a little look online and found this Pakistani recipe, which as ever I tweaked slightly. It was perfect, and delicious. I had never thought to use kidney beans in a curry recipe, and it made a nice change from the usual dal I make (which I'll have to upload onto here sometime...). You can make it with dried coriander but fresh is better, and I have to admit I sent my boyfriend to the shop down the road to get it, which defeated the point of cooking with what I had in the cupboard, but oh well! I've since found out that the correct name for this is 'Dal Makhani', and it is supposed to be cooked with black lentils. I used red lentils though, and it was amazing. I wanted more but only made two portions, which I regretted afterwards... I've also since seen much more complex recipes for this, but I like the simplicity of this recipe, using very few strong flavours, so I've not tried them.

Leek and Potato Soup

Leek and potato soup is great comfort food now the evenings are long and it's cold out. The combination of milk and cream in this recipe means this soup is not too rich, but retains a lovely creamy texture. You could jazz things up a bit by garnishing with some fresh chives, but I didn't bother. 

Red Onion, Thyme, and Smoked Applewood Cheddar Potato Dauphinoise

Inspiration for this dish comes from my brother Jesse, who a while back told me he'd invented a potato gratin with red onion, thyme, and smoked applewood cheddar and suggested I might want to try it out for this blog. It took me a few attempts to get this right, and what I learnt from these attempts was that the golden rules when it comes to potato dauphinoise are:

1. Slice the potato as thinly as possible (I used a boxed cheese grater).
2. Don't pre-cook the potato - you need the starch to thicken the sauce.
3. Don't try to lower the fat content of the recipe by using milk; it does not work and you end up with a far inferior dish.

After a few attempts, I was able to get this dish down to perfection; my boyfriend's comment after he'd taken his first bite: 'Yep, you've smashed it'. I think that about sums it up. A warning: this is a highly indulgent and rich dish.

Macaroni Peas

A nice, relatively quick and quite unusual pasta sauce recipe. I (slightly) adapted this from Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's excellent cookbook 'River Cottage Veg Every Day!'.. which as I have said on a number of occasions, is currently my favourite cookbook, and I cannot recommend it highly enough. If you don't have macaroni, any other pasta shape will do, really.

Artichoke Pasta Sauce

This is a relatively simply (in terms of flavour) but quite satisfying pasta sauce that I came across in another one of my many, very old, cookbooks that I got second hand from a charity shop at some point. You could use fresh artichokes if you can find them, but I used tinned for ease of cooking, since it makes the dish much quicker to cook. Not many photos on this one (or from now on, in fact) as the days have gotten so short I can't get any decent light in my kitchen when cooking.

Mango and Clementine Tarte Tatin

A while back I had an overly ripe mango and wanted a recipe to do something with it. I found a recipe for mango tarte tatin online, but as I started to cook it, it had all the measurements completely wrong, with too much pastry and too little fruit. So I played it by ear a bit and modified it, adding in a clementine. The result turned out nicely, though you may want to add more fruit. As always, if you prefer to use ready made pastry, go ahead.

Wholewheat Banana Nut Loaf

I credit this recipe with introducing me to the joys of baking. High praise indeed, and worth it. Cake is one of my big weaknesses and this particular cake is, to me, everything a cake should be: moist, tasty, with the walnuts adding a lovely bit of crunch. Back in the 2006/07 academic year, I was studying for my masters and during exam time needed something to do during my revision breaks. That something was baking this cake. Once I perfected this recipe, I started experimenting with other baking recipes, and the rest, as they say, is history.